Names in the News

And now he says he owes his success, in part, to how he handled getting ``beat up″ when he started as host of NBC’s ``Tonight Show″ in 1992.

``Everybody, from the truck driver on the street to stars, would say: `I watched you when you got beat up and you didn’t complain about it. You just tried to do a better show.′

``That attitude seems to be what’s gotten us this far,″ Leno, 45, said as he prepared to take ``Tonight″ on the road to Las Vegas next week with guests including Robin Williams and Mel Gibson.

``Tonight″ has bested David Letterman’s ``Late Show″ on CBS in recent ratings, and won this year’s Emmy for outstanding variety series.

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PIGEON FORGE, Tenn. (AP) _ Imagine having your very own library before even starting kindergarten.

Dolly Parton is offering the newborns of Sevier County _ her own birthplace _ a book a month for the next five years until kindergarten.

The Dollywood Foundation expects to register more than 4,000 children as the program’s first participants, and distribute more than a quarter of a million books over five years at a cost of more than $1 million.

The foundation also will buy and distribute 150,000 books for current pre-schoolers in the county.

``I’m just a big kid myself,″ Parton said in announcing the ``Imagination Library″ program Thursday.

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CLINTON, Okla. (AP) _ If the ad for Garth Brooks’ latest release is any indication, the album will go over big, real BIG.

Stan Herd, an artist from Lawrence, Kan., is using 50 acres of a farmer’s wheat field as his canvas to create a billboard touting ``Fresh Horses,″ the country music singer’s first release in two years. It’s due out later this month.

``Each letter seems like roughly the size of a football field,″ farmer Kirk Meacham said. ``It really makes a dramatic impression when you are in the air and look down at it. It really grabs you.″

The word ``Horses″ alone is about 2,700 feet long, he said.

The farm, roughly 80 miles west of Oklahoma City, sits beneath the flight path for planes heading west to Los Angeles.